One Last Chance
by megann310
Summary: Lucy and her dad have been fighting a lot. Now a twoshot.
1. Chapter 1

I hate you.

It was those three words that had been bothering Lucy Messer all morning long. It was those three words, and the look on his face when she had screamed it at him, that were swimming around in her mind and wouldn't go away.

Earlier that morning, she'd had another fight with her dad. Fighting with him seemed to have become a regular thing lately. It seemed to get worse everyday, and Lucy figured that the one that they had this morning was the worst one yet. Never had she told him that she hated him. She'd always sworn that she wouldn't, no matter what, but that morning, it had just slipped out. The hurt look on his face before leaving to go to work had nearly killed her. And to make matters worse, Lucy couldn't even remember what they had been fighting about in the first place.

She couldn't even remember how things had gotten so bad between her and her father. They had always been extremely close, but it seemed as she got older, they drifted apart. Her mother said it was because they were both so stubborn, but it would end before she knew it. Lucy prayed that she was right. She hated fighting with him, she really did. She loved him and she wanted things to go back to normal. It just seemed that the harder she tried to avoid fights, the more they happened. It was driving her crazy, and it was making her lose focus on everything around her, especially school.

"Ms. Messer."

Lucy glanced up from her notebook she had been staring at. Her English teacher, Mr. Williams, was looking at her, and she knew he had asked her a question. She quickly glanced back down at her notebook, trying to read the notes she had scribbled down. She looked back at Mr. Williams, who was waiting for an answer.

"Uh, a simile compares two things using like or as and a metaphor compares two things without using like or as," she answered, positive that was the last thing they had been talking about before she drifted off into space.

"Great. That would have been a perfect answer twenty minutes ago, but now we're talking about Romeo & Juliet," Mr. Williams said.

Lucy felt herself turning red as the rest of her classmates started to laugh. She glanced at Mr. Williams, who was giving her a concerned look. Lucy just shrugged, her way of apologizing for being distracted.

Once the class had stopped laughing and started talking Shakespeare again, Lucy went back to thinking. She had to end this fighting with her dad before she failed the tenth grade.

And it wasn't just her who had lost focus. Her mother would tell her about how distant her dad was at work, and it all had to due with the fighting. Lucy didn't know if her mother had told her this to make her feel guilty or not, but either way, it worked. She had to end this fighting or else her and her dad would end up in therapy, which was her mother's biggest fear. She had hurt her dad enough already. She wasn't about to do it to her mother, also.

Carefully, Lucy pulled her cell phone out of her pocket. She kept it at her side, making sure her teacher didn't see her and take the phone away.

She typed in her dad's number, then sent him a text. She asked him if he would be able to order pizza and watch a game on tv with her that night. He had the night off, so Lucy was just hoping he didn't get caught up at work.

Lucy put her phone back in her pocket and sighed softly. She had taken the first step in making her relationship with her dad better, and already she was feeling good again.

For the next five minutes, Lucy listened as Mr. Williams talked about the love between Romeo and Juliet. His talking was interrupted by a knock at the door and Lucy watched as he walked across the room to open it. Her interest of who was at the door went away when she realized it was only Ms. Nelson, the school's secretary. Lucy decided that while Mr. Williams was busy talking, she would start taking notes on what she had missed when she wasn't paying attention.

She hadn't even written an entire sentence before Mr. Williams had walked over to her desk. He kneeled down so that he could look her in the yees. Lucy swore she saw a look of sadness in his that weren't there before.

"Lucy, you need to go with Ms. Nelson," he said quietly so the others in clas wouldn't hear him. Lucy looked at him, confused, but she nodded and stood up, shoving her notebook into her backpack.

Ignoring the whispers from her classmates who were trying to figure out what she had done, Lucy walked out of the classroom. She let Ms. Nelson guide her to the principal's office. She felt nervous, and her hands started to shake. She didn't know why the hell she was going to the principal's office. She'd never been in trouble before, and she didn't know what she could have done that had caused her to get in trouble now. Unless Mr. Williams had called the principal because she hadn't been paying attention, but she figured that couldn't be it.

When Lucy walked into the principal's office, all of her worries about her being in trouble went away, and she felt her heart drop. Her mother was sitting on the couch in the tiny room, sobbing. Her uncle Flack was sitting next to her, obviously there to comfort her. However, Lucy could see that his eyes were red from crying.

Lucy quickly dropped her stuff and hurried over to the two.

"Mom, what's wrong?" she asked, placing a hand on her shoulder. Lucy watched as her mom lifted her head up from her hands. Her normally happy brown eyes were full of hurt and sadness. She tried to speak, but she just started crying harder. Lucy felt her heart sink even lower. She knew what was happening.

"Where's Daddy?" Lucy whispered. She knew her mom couldn't speak, so she looked at Flack.

"Luce, there was a shootout today," he began, but he couldn't control himself and he too started sobbing.

Lucy felt like she couldn't breathe. She wanted to ask if he was okay, but the look in Flack's eyes confirmed the worst.

He wasn't going to be alright. He wasn't going to be coming home.

She could feel her head spinning and the tears began falling down her face.

He was dead.

And because of all the damn fights that all seemed so stupid now, she'd never gotten that one last chance to tell him I love you.

He died thinking she hated him.

And she'd have to live with that for the rest of her life.

**Please don't hate me for this. **

**Or at least don't hate me so much that you won't review! **


	2. Chapter 2

**I wasn't planning on doing this, but I thought, "Eh, what the heck!". So here we go. **

**Disclaimer: I own nothing. **

The next morning Lucy woke up, her head pounding. She groaned as she hit the off button on her alarm, then she thought about what had happened the day before. As she did, she felt fresh tears form in her eyes and her stomach drop. She couldn't believe he was actually gone. It was just so unfair! Who was going to chase away the boys who hit on her now? Or play baseball in the park with her on Sundays? Or love her no matter how many times she screwed up? Of course she had her mom, and her uncles and Aunt Stella, but no one could ever replace her daddy, no matter how hard they tried.

As Lucy was about to roll out of bed, she topped when she smelled something a little out of place. Was that bacon? Sure, any other day it would have been normal, but not on a morning like this. She knew her mother wouldn't be able to get out of bed for days.

Maybe it was Stella cooking, trying to be helpful. Getting out of bed, she left her room and made her way to the kitchen. When she got there, she stopped dead in her tracks. There was her mother, dancing around the kitchen to some country song on the radio, a bowl and a spoon in her hands. She seemed happy. Way too happy for someone who just lost the love of her life.

Maybe this was how she dealt with grief?

At the moment, Lindsay had her back turned to her daughter, but when she turned around, she gave Lucy a huge grin.

"Hey baby, you hungry? I'm making blueberry pancakes and bacon," she said in a cheerful voice. Lucy just stared at her, her jaw slightly dropped. "Lucy, what's wrong/" she asked, noticing that it looked like she had just got done crying. She set the batter down on the counter and switched off the radio, then she walked over to her daughter.

"I, uh, I...why aren't you upset about yesterday?" Lucy asked, her voice trembling.

"Yesterday? What happened yesterday?" Lindsay asked.

"Dad, he's...where is he?"

Lindsay gave her a confused look. "He's at work. Why?"

She watched in confusion as her daughter broke down sobbing. Immediately, she wrapped her arms around her, rubbing her back soothingly. "Baby, what's going on?"

"Oh Mom, it was...horrible!" Lucy said in between sobs. "I had a nightmare...Daddy got shot...he died."

Lindsay sighed, understanding now exactly how Lucy was feeling. She couldn't even count how many times she had woken up from a horrible nightmare like that.

"Oh sweetie, shhh, it's okay, he's alright. It was only a bad dream."

Lucy nodded slowly as she listened to her mother's comforting words. She felt like she was four years old again and she'd just woken up from a nightmare about killer clowns or something like that. Only this nightmare was something that could happen at any moment in her life, to either her dad or her mom, and that thought scared the crap out of her.

"I'm just so afraid that one day I'll wake up and find out that it wasn't just a nightmare."

Lindsay nodded as she listened, wishing there was something she could do to get rid of Lucy's fears, but she knew that wouldn't happen. Her and Danny's jobs were risky, so all of them lived with those fears everyday.

"Listen Luce, I know you're scared, but your dad and I know what we're doing on the job, and we're going to use that knowledge to come home to you everyday. And if, God forbid, something does happen to your dad, we'll get through it. I know we would. We're strong. And I know that you and him would do the same if something happened to me. But you can't let those fears control your life. You have to just live everyday to the fullest," Lindsay said, feeling relieved when she saw that Lucy had stopped crying.

"But what if one of you....well, you know...without knowing that I love you?" Lucy asked quietly. That's when Lindsay realized that this was more than just about one of them dying. It was about the fighting between her daughter and her husband. She knew all the fighting was tearing Danny apart, but she hadn't seen how it was affecting Lucy until now.

"You know that wouldn't happen. I know how much you love me, and your dad knows you love him just as much as he loves you."

Lucy sighed and nodded her head. "Yeah, I know, but I'm still scared it could happen like that," she said. Before her mother could speak again, she began to walk away. "I should get ready for school. I'll eat breakfast when I'm done. Thanks for the talk."

She smiled at her mom, then turned around to go back to her bedroom. It was time she made things right with her and her dad.

_______________________________________________________

Danny leaned back in his chair and sighed loudly as he stared at the paperwork in front of him. It was going to be one of those days that he hated. A long, slow day filled with paperwork and Adam doing weird things. Normally Danny could get through those days just fine, but that was hwne he had Lindsay to help him, or more like distract him. Today was her day off though, so he was on his own.

Feeling his phone vibrating in his pocket, he grinned at the thought of it being his wife, calling to talk to him because she had somehow known he was bored out of his mind. However, instead of seeing Lindsay's name on the screen, he saw Lucy's.

"Hey Luce, everything okay?"

"Yeah, everything's fine," she answered. Danny could tell she was lying. She wouldn't have been calling if there wasn't anything wrong, at least not with the way things had been going between them lately. "I just want to talk. Are you busy?" Ore maybe she did just want to talk.

He looked at the massive amount of paperwork on his desk, shook his head, then remembered she couldn't see him. "No, I'm not busy. What's up?"He heard her sigh, and he knew she was thinking carefully about what she should say.

"Daddy, I'm sorry."

It took a second to register what she'd just said. First of all, she'd called him daddy again, something she hadn't called him in a long time. And she had apologized. What for?

"Why're you sorry?" he asked.

"For being a horrible daughter. For fighting with you about everything," she explained. Danny knew that by the change in her voice from normal to high pitched that she was crying. He ran a hand through his hair, wishing she was in front of him so he could hug her.

"No, baby, don't be sorry. You're not a horrible daughter. And if anyone should be apologizing, it should be me. I've been treating you like you're still a baby, and I've gotta realize that you're not one anymore. You're growing up, and I have to let you do more things on your own," he explained.

"Well, things would be easier if I didn't have to argue about every damn thing with you. Sorry, every darn thing," she said, sniffling.

"Hey, you're a Messer. It's what you do." He smiled when he heard her chuckle a little. "Listen, why don't you go to school, then when you come home, we'll spend the afternoon together, just you and me. We can talk things through and make them better. How's that sound?"

"Great, but what about work?" she asked.

"I think your uncle Mac and I can work something out."

"Okay then. After school sounds perfect. I should go or else I'll be late for school. I love you Daddy, you know that, right?"

Danny smiled the biggest smile at his daughter's words. "I know. I love you too, baby girl."

After he hung up the phone, Danny couldn't stop smiling. Maybe he was wrong. Maybe today wasn't going to be as bad as he thought.

**Happy ending, yay! =)**


End file.
